Journalistic ethics, from J.D.'s transcript of the Panel

Christian Crumlish

In New Media Musings, J.D. Lasica writes:

Hadn't realized this, but yesterday OJR published my column on weblogs and journalism — or, more accurately, a partial transcript of the panel at UC Berkeley last week...

He quotes an excerpt on journalistic ethics and blogging from Rebecca Blood that I want to repeat here because my loose paraphrase in my subjective transcript is much weaker (I will, in fact, update the transcript after reviewing J.D.'s version):

Blood: Journalistic ethics hold to an ideal of fairness and accuracy. I don't know of any personal weblogs that are trying to do anything like presenting a complete and balanced story. We need to distinguish between journalists doing personal weblogs and journalists doing weblogs for their publication. If I'm a journalist doing a weblog for my publication, do standards of fairness and accuracy apply? How much do I need to know about something before I put it up? I can't just put an e-mail I get up there, or can I?

Lasica did a great job of peppering the transcript with pithy links. Reading the (more accurate than my own) transcript is an interesting experience. Besides enabling me to relive the panel, it also reveals to me some of my biases and what I projected on as well as what I took away from panel discussion.